ASPLinux was Russian company developing ASPLinux distribution and providing a wide range of professional services such as porting existing applications to Linux from other OS, development of embedded GNU/Linux solutions for custom hardware platforms such as consumer electronic devices, including porting GNU/Linux OS itself if needed, software development for GNU/Linux, technical support, consulting, training. In March 2001 ASPLinux and Black Cat Linux Team, developers of the popular in Russia and CIS Linux distrubution, merged. ASPLinux company headquarters are located in Moscow.

Following six release candidates spanned over 16 months, today Neal Murphy announced the final release of Smoothwall Express 3.1. This is an updated version of the project's specialist distribution for firewalls. From the release announcement: "The Smoothwall community is pleased to announce the release of the long-awaited Smoothwall Express 3.1 firewall. This release is a refresh of the Smoothwall Express 3.0 foundation and a culmination of five years of effort that began with the Roadster Test Vehicle. The build system has been thoroughly worked over, and the user interface has been freshened with several presentation improvements. The vast majority of the work was done 'under the hood'. Here are just a few of the software upgrades: Linux kernel 3.4.104, glibc 2.18, GCC 4.7.3, Perl 5.14.4, Squid 3.3.13, httpd 2.2.27, iptables 1.4.14, and OpenSwan 2.6.41. Some of these updates are ready to enable new features such as HTTPS proxying in Squid. In addition to these updates, numerous bugs present in 3.0." Download (MD5): Express-3.1-x86_64.iso (204MB). Also available from OSDisc.

Neal Murphy has announced the availability of the fifth release candidate for Smoothwall Express 3.1, a Linux-based operating system designed for firewalls and routers: "Smoothwall Express 3.1 fifth release candidate available. A note about previous RCs: if you are running RC1, RC2, RC3, RC4 or an earlier RC5 daily build, you must install RC5 ASAP. OpenSSL had a major bug that could leak data to unauthorized parties. Second, IPv6 was not correctly firewalled before RC4; there's a small chance your UI and/or SSH could be accessed from RED via a link-local address; this bug is present in Roadster, too. This release is a refresh of 3.0's foundation and a culmination of five years of effort that began with the Roadster Test Vehicle. The build system has been thoroughly worked over, and the user interface has been freshened with several presentation improvements." See the full release announcement for a complete changelog. Download (MD5): Express-3.1-rc5-x86_64.iso (206MB).

Neal Murphy has announced the availability of the fourth release candidate for Smoothwall Express 3.1, a specialist distribution for firewalls and routers: "The Smoothwall community is pleased to announce the fourth release candidate for our long awaited Smoothwall Express 3.1 firewall. RC4 corrects a few problems found in the third release candidate, settles on i586 and x86_64 as the system architectures that will cause the fewest problems when upgrading from 3.0, has a much re-worked QoS feature, and has Marco's URL Filter mod fully integrated. We expect RC4 to be the last release candidate before we release Smoothwall Express 3.1. The vast majority of the work was done 'under the hood'. Here are just a few of the software upgrades: Linux kernel 3.4, glibc 2.18, GCC 4.7.2, Perl 5.14.4, Squid 3.3.5, httpd 2.2.24, iptables 1.4.14 and Openswan 2.6.39." Read the rest of the release announcement for more information and a detailed changelog. Download (MD5): Express-3.1-rc4-x86_64.iso (206MB).

Neal Murphy has announced the availability of the third release candidate for Smoothwall Express 3.1, an Internet firewall/router distribution designed to run on commodity hardware and to provide an easy-to-use administration interface: "The Smoothwall community is pleased to announce the third release candidate for our long-awaited Smoothwall Express 3.1 firewall. RC3 corrects a number of usability problems found in the second release candidate. This release is a refresh of 3.0's foundation and a culmination of four years of effort that began with the roadster test vehicle. The build system has been thoroughly worked over, and the user interface has been freshened with several presentation improvements. The vast majority of the work was done 'under the hood'. Here are just a few of the software upgrades: Linux kernel 3.4, glibc 2.14.1, GCC 4.7.2, Perl 5.14.4, Squid 3.3.5, httpd 2.2.24, iptables 1.4.14, and Openswan 2.6.38." See the full release announcement for a detailed changelog. Download (MD5): Express-3.1-rc3-x86_64.iso (316MB).

Neal Murphy has announced that the second release candidate for Smoothwall Express 3.1, a specialist firewall distribution featuring a security-hardened GNU/Linux operating system and an intuitive web administration interface, is ready for testing: "The Smoothwall community is pleased to announce the second release candidate for our long-awaited Smoothwall Express 3.1 Firewall. RC2 corrects a number of usability problems found in the first release candidate. The build system has been thoroughly worked over, and the user interface has been freshened with several presentation improvements. The vast majority of the work was done 'under the hood'. Here are just a few of the software upgrades: Linux kernel 3.4, glibc 2.14.1, GCC 4.7.2, Perl 5.14.4, Squid 3.3.5, httpd 2.2.24, iptables 1.4.14 and Openswan 2.6.38." Read the full release announcement for information about key new features and improvements in Smoothwall Express 3.1. Download (MD5): Express-3.1-rc2-x86_64.iso (216MB), Express-3.1-rc2-i686.iso (209MB).

Neal Murphy has announced the availability of the first release candidate for Smoothwall 3.1, a firewall distribution that includes its own security-hardened GNU/Linux kernel and an easy-to-use web interface: "Today we have released the Smoothwall Express 3.1 release candidate 1 installation CD image for widespread testing and bug squashing. This new CD contains Smoothwall Express 3.1, a refresh of version 3.0. Numerous latent and hard-to-reproduce bugs in 3.0 were eliminated during development. Updated runtime software includes Linux kernel 3.4, glibc 2.14.1, binutils 2.22, iptables 1.4.14 and xtables-addons 1.45, OpenSwan 2.6.38, Snort 2.9.4.6 and Squid 3.1.23. The user interface has been freshened with the new Smoothwall logo and a number of presentation improvements. There are two new features: Plug-n-Play Backup, and automatic translations for non-English-speaking users." Read the rest of the release announcement for more information. Download (MD5): Express-3.1-rc1-x86_64.iso (216MB), Express-3.1-rc1-i686.iso (209MB).

SmoothWall Express 3.0, a free firewall distribution that includes its own security-hardened GNU/Linux operating system and an easy-to-use web interface, has been released: "Express 3.0 is our latest version of the long running and successful SmoothWall Express firewall. Headline new features relative to 2.0: supports a 4th network card for Wireless Access Points; 64-bit support; based upon Linux 2.6 kernel; new realtime traffic graph shows traffic bandwidth usage over time (AJAX); per-IP address traffic statistics collection in all traffic stats pages; Instant Messenger proxy with logging and filtering abilities; SATA and SCSI support; streamlined installer and setup; outbound filtering; new update mechanism which can download and install all pending updates with a single click...." Read the comprehensive release notes for full details. Download (MD5): smoothwall-express-3.0-i386.iso (68.9MB), smoothwall-express-3.0-x86_64.iso (70.3MB).

The first release candidate of SmoothWall Express 3.0 is ready for testing: "Express 3.0 is our latest version of the long running and successful SmoothWall Express firewall. This is a release candidate release, code name 'Sammy'. This means that this build will become the final version of SmoothWall Express 3.0, assuming no problems are found. New features and fixes relative to the previous Express 3.0 beta, Degu: final changes to the theme graphics to incorporate the polar bear silhouette, including the boot screen; added missing page descriptions; added support for empty hostnames in Dynamic DNS pages; MySmoothWall integration; build system now uses hosts resolv.conf instead of makefile variables; runtime kernel now has DMA support for all supported IDE chipsets...." Read the comprehensive release notes for further details. Download (MD5): smoothwall-express-3.0-sammy-i386.iso (68.5MB), smoothwall-express-3.0-sammy-x86_64.iso (70.0MB).

The first beta release of SmoothWall Express, a popular firewall distribution, is ready for testing: "SmoothWall is pleased to announce the much-awaited release of the beta, feature-complete version of Express 3.0. Code-named 'Degu', 3.0 is the latest version of our successful and long-running express firewall software and incorporates a number of new features and improvements. Designed to be easier to install and configure, the new version (based upon the latest Linux 2.6 kernel) is a big advance beyond Version 2. Significant new features include: a much improved user interface; additional 'purple' network interface; additional support for newer hardware (including 64-bit processors); improved VPN subsystem...." Read the rest of the release announcement for further details. DownloadMD5: smoothwall-express-3.0-degu-i686.iso (65.6MB), smoothwall-express-3.0-degu-x86_64.iso (67.5MB).

A new development build of SmoothWall Express 3.0 has been released for public testing: "Express 3.0 is our latest version of the long running and successful SmoothWall Express firewall. This is an alpha release, code name "koala". This means that although this build is working and usable, it is not feature-complete." Some of the new features relative to version 2.0 include: "Based upon the latest 2.6 kernel; brand new theme; includes many new NIC drivers; brand new update system; NTP service for the local network; local hosts list that can be served through the DNS proxy; replacement traffic stats page; SIP NAT support; many internal changes to make the code more organised and easier to work with...." See the release announcement and release notes for further details. Download: smoothwall-express-3.0-koala.iso (48.1MB).

The first development release of the all-new SmoothWall Express firewall has arrived: "On the fifth anniversary of the first SmoothWall firewall, Internet security specialist SmoothWall Limited is pleased to announce the availability of the first test version of SmoothWall Express 3, the latest version of the world's most popular firewall appliance software. Express 3 is based on the latest Linux 2.6 kernel and features a new open architecture designed to make it easy for software developers to produce their own security components for SmoothWall. This is intended to foster the development of new and improved open source software, to the benefit of the open source movement as a whole." Read the release announcement and release notes for further details. Download: smoothwall-express-3.0-grizzly.iso (45.8MB).

After more than 15 months in development, SmoothWall Express (formerly known as SmoothWall GPL) 2.0 has been released: "We are pleased to announce the release of SmoothWall Express 2.0. Changes include: 2.4 kernel; new web interface; new and improved networking options; many bugs corrected throughout the beta programme; and much more..." Read the rest of the announcement, release notes and known issues for additional information. Download: smoothwall-2.0.iso (33.8MB).

The seventh beta on the road to SmoothWall 2.0 is now available. From the release notes: "Security fixes for openssh and openssl; fixed graphs for png; fixed .htaccess bug; fixed snort log rotation, after a long period of use, it was possible for snort to fail to start due to a full logging directory; fixed gettime.pl bug whereby time not saved to cmos because of bad path to hwclock binary; advanced networking features (ping, igmp, etc); IP blocking (including from firewall log); fixed DHCP client problem whereby a network restart would not kill the dhcpcd process; backup and restore of configuration to floppy or floppy image; updated BeWAN driver - this allegedly fixes a problem when the card is on a shared IRQ..." Download: smoothwall-2.0-pendolino.iso (32.9MB).

Besides the GPL edition, SmoothWall, Ltd also produces an enterprise level SmoothWall Corporate Server. Richard Drummond: "SmoothWall Corporate Server builds on the strengths of the free SmoothWall to create a more scalable product. The increased hardware support, the more flexible networking tools - such as the support for multiple sub-nets - and the modular, extensible architecture will certainly widen its appeal to larger businesses. I have two main worries. One is that SmoothWall is based on a 2.2 kernel and so support for newer hardware isn't as good as it might have been had it had been based on a 2.4 kernel (I know the system was originally meant for redundant hardware, but scaling up to larger networks requires more horsepower, after all.) My second concern is the lack of any automated tools for firewall monitoring." The complete review, published in an earlier edition of Linux Format is available here.

The SmoothWall project has released the 5th beta (code name "Orient") of SmoothWall 2.0: Orient is the fifth beta for the 2.0 series SmoothWall GPL. Changes since Mallard - there have been quite a few, spread over the last couple of months. The items that spring to mind are: 2.4.21 kernel; NTP time syncing (of the SmoothWall time, not a NTP service for GREEN, which will come later), time zone now set in the UI not in the setup program; updates lists can now be retrieved through a proxy, if your ISP blocks all outgoing 80s, no facility to pass a password through to this server as yet; tweaks to the UI; misc. other items." See the complete list of changes in the release announcement. Download: smoothwall-2.0-orient.iso (22MB).

A new SmoothWall beta is out: "We are pleased to announce the release of SmoothWall GPL 2.0 beta 4, codename 'Mallard'. After the successful releases of betas 1 ('metro') and 2 ('bullet'), beta 4 includes major updates to the networking capabilities of SmoothWall GPL. Lawrence has slaved over a hot keyboard, and melted many a modem to improve the support for the U.S. Robotics SureConnect USB ADSL modem, and also USB ADSL modems based on the ECI chipset, such as the Fujitsu FDX310. Feedback is especially sought for ECI-based modems, so if you connect using one, please let us know, whether you have successful connections or not! Users with the new-style USB Home Highway ISDN connections from BT will now be able to connect their USB-enabled SmoothWall GPL 2.0 directly to the wall socket, thanks to the sterling work of Alan Hourihane." The announcement, release notes and download: smoothwall-2.0-mallard.iso (22.7MB).

SmoothWall 1.0 has been released: "SmoothWall GPL 1.0 is the result of the natural evolution of the 0.9.9 build. Use the ISO for a fresh new install or update your 0.9.9 install to 1.0 with the fixes 21 update." You can get it here: smoothwall-1.0.iso (20.7MB). On a related note, LinuxOrbit has published a HOWTO entitled Sharing Broadband Internet Access with SmoothWall 0.9.9, a step-by-step instruction to set up a fully functional firewall, router or getaway and share Internet connection on a network. Read it here.

A second beta of SmoothWall 2.0 has been released: "Bullet is the second public beta for the 2.0 series SmoothWall GPL. Some minor enhancements have been made, and the driver list for NICs has been updated to match 2.4.19. Please send feedback, both positive and negative, to submissions@smoothwall.org." Links: SmoothWall's Beta Programme page with screenshots, Bullet release notes, mirror list and the ISO image: smoothwall-2.0-bullet.iso (22.9MB).

The first beta of the new SmoothWall 2.0, code named "metro" has been released for public testing: "Metro is the first public beta for the 2.0 series SmoothWall GPL. It is the first new release since 0.9.9 was released back in late September 2001. We imagine that the beta period will take some weeks, during which time we are also seeking translators. Please see the website for more information if you think you can help!" All information related to this beta can be found on the distribution's Beta Programme page and SmoothWall 2.0 beta1 page. Download it here: smoothwall-2.0-metro.iso (23MB) or from one of the mirrors.

c't magazine: "When a group of developers want to successfully distribute a good product, they are usually interested in feedback, in order to improve their product. My concrete indications of security problems within SmoothWall found sheer disinterest with Richard Morrell, developer and project initiator. 'That doesn't matter' was about the politest of all comments. Trust in the developer's competence and integrity is a basic prerequisite for the usage of security relevant software. Morrell has thoroughly destroyed mine." Read the full review by the c't magazine here and join the Slashdot discussion (which includes a response given by a lead developer at SmoothWall) on the subject of this highly negative review. For more information about SmoothWall and links to other reviews, please visit our SmoothWall page.

3CX Phone System is a specialist, Debian-based Linux distribution designed to run a complete unified communications platform. The 3CX client, included in the distribution, can also be installed separately on most hardware as well as the cloud. It provides a complete open standards-based IP PBX and phone system that works with popular SIP trunks and IP phones. It will automatically configure all supported peripherals and it also comes with clients for Windows, OS X, iOS and Android. The ISO image includes a free license for the 3CX PBX edition. The ISO image contains the standard Debian installer which installs a minimal system with the nginx web server, PostgreSQL database, iptables firewall and Secure Shell. Options not relevant to 3CX have been removed form the distribution. Download the installation ISO image from here: debian-8.6.0-amd64-netinst-3cx.iso (265MB).

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